pumpkinstrokemarrow

BH thought to cook them in cider. Which had the odd result that when I was snuffling around the kitchen towards the end of the operation, I caught a very strong smell of cream of tomato soup - despite assurances that there were no tomatoes whatsoever involved. Product not bad though, improved by the rabbits turning out to have been trapped rather than shot, or at least not shot as there were no shot and no clots, both rather unsightly on the dinner plate. Three of us more or less did for two rabbits, just enough left over for me to have for supper on bread.

Usually these olefactual anomalies are a strong signal that a cold is coming on. In this case I have just had one, so I hope it is not de retour.

Following the posting on 9th June, I did indeed give Amazon a prod and obtained a book about the Koran in its historical context edited by one Gabriel Said Reynolds - which, as a non specialist I have found rather heavy going. And ultimately boring. This because, while Muslims may believe that the Koran was given to Muhammad by Allah and that there is no need to look further, the proper business of Muslims being to look forward not back, I believe that the Koran has to come from somewhere. And given that it came from the south eastern fringes of the Roman/Jewish/Greek/Christian world, it seems probable that it will draw on those traditions. Subsume, accommodate or comment on stories and beliefs from those worlds. Reynolds' contributors spend a lot of time and effort spelling out the detail of this accommodation, drawing on specialist knowledge of the languages current in the area at the time. Too which my response has become the 'so?' which stroppy adolescents are so fond of.

Of more interest to me, is the notion that Muslims believe in faith, hope and charity in much the same way as Christians. Equally progressive in the early days. But they are much tougher on there being just one god, dumping the trinity business which caused so much strife in the early Christian church and which was not, I believe, very popular in the eastern part of that church, and are much tougher on making images, with not just golden calves being banned, but any kind of representation of animals or people in churches, just to be on the safe side. And if one god is the key difference, that might explain why the Christians did relatively well in the lush north west with all the divine livestock in its woodlands - trolls, elves, dryads and the like - while the Muslims did relatively well in the arid south east, where the sun and monotheism would be so much stronger. Although, to be fair, I do not think that they are free of auxiliary divinities. The 'Arabian Nights' is full of them. Argument further collapses as one moves further south and east where it becomes a lot more lush than north western Europe. Must put thinking cap on.